_Reply._--Right? Of course it is. I'm here, and I ought to know.
I notice that the Ladies have a race all to themselves. Doubtless this is due to Miss FAWCETT's pernicious example, but the innovation is not to be commended. The entries for the Visitors are of average quality. Three visitors only are to compete over a course of picnic luncheons and strawberries and cream. I have only room left to remark that the weather has been changeable, and that all the above tips are to be thoroughly relied upon.
DUNCAN gay came here to woo, Ha, ha, the wooing o't! 'Gainst CAINE, who thought all drinkers fou, Ha, ha, the wooing o't! CAINE, he held his head full high, At GLADSTONE sneered _and_ SALISBURY, And bade brave DUNCAN just stand by; Ha, ha, the wooing o't!
DUNCAN was a lad o' grace, Ha, ha, the wooing o't! On the poll he gat first place. Ha, ha, the wooing o't! Woe for WILLIAM SPROSTON CAINE! Shifting swift and swagger vain He will hardly try again; Ha, ha, the wooing o't!
NEW TITLE. The Public-house Compensation Bill shall be hereafter known and alluded to as the _Bung Bungle'd Bill_.
CHORUS OF LONGING LADS. "WISH _WE_ COULD GO TO THE COUNTRY!"]
[Illustration: EVOLUTIONARY ASSIMILATION.
_A Story of Signor Piatti and his 'Cello._]
The stillness of the Summer day Broods o'er the country sweet, And all things, save the murmuring stream, Are silent in the heat. The sunbeams through the green leaves play, The air is sweet with new-mown hay-- But I am bound at home to stay Here in Great Gasworks Street.
On the fourth-floor I take the air, And hear the trains roll by, And dream of all the visions fair That o'er the housetops lie; The meadows where the daisies stray, The bleating sheep, as white as they, The breakers and the sparkling spray, Beneath the smokeless sky.
There's MINNIE in the cradle, And TOMMY on the floor, And JOHNNY with a ladle Is banging on the door; And, where the household linen dries, Cross little ANNIE sits and cries As loud as she can roar.
About the street the children sprawl, Or on the door-steps sit; The women, gay with kerchief-shawl, Engage the men with wit, Who lounge at ease against the wall, And meditate and spit.
So through the Summer Sunday hours The sunbeams slowly steal, Gilding the beer-shop's saw-dust bowers, The cabbage-stalks in lieu of flowers, The trodden orange-peel, Till, calm as heaven, the moon appears, A Sister in a house of tears, Who soothes, but cannot heal.